Screened Out – The Visit

[two-star-rating]Olivia DeJonge, Ed Oxenbould, Deanna Dunagan, Peter McRobbie, Kathryn Hahn[/two-star-rating]

To say this isn’t M. Night Shyamalan’s worst film isn’t saying much. His last four flicks were Lady in the Water, The Happening, The Last Airbender, and After Earth. By that abysmal track record, The Visit is a roaring success. Still, this film cannot tell if it’s a horror or a comedy. The premise requires us to buy too much, and the last 20 minutes are patently absurd.

This is the man who was called “the next Spielberg” after his first – and best film – The Sixth Sense. From that point, his career was a slow journey into stupidity, his requisite plot twists getting more frustrating and ridiculous. The Visit isn’t quite as infuriating as The Happening, but it’s certainly no Spielberg…or Hitchcock…or whoever Shyamalan was aiming for.

This film was has been billed in the press as his comeback. Not so much.

Teenaged DeJonge and Oxenbould portray sister and brother, Becca and Tyler. Their family – especially their mom (Hahn, the only “star”, a TV actor in a smaller part) – is still shattered after Dad abandoned them for a younger wife across the country. However, Mom is getting back on her feet. She’s dating a doting man, and she’s even started to patch up a 15-year rift with her grandparents, whom the kids have never met.

Now, technology is all over this film. Becca wants to be a documentary filmmaker, and she and her brother take cameras everywhere. Mom says that the grandparents reached out to her through Facebook, and then they Skyped. So, already it seems weird that, at some point, Mom wouldn’t have shared pictures of Becca and Tyler with her parents and vice versa.

Mom’s booked a cruise with her boyfriend, and to given them space, the kids agree to train to Pennsylvania, to a remote farm with no cell reception, to get to know Pop Pop and Nana. They’re meeting each other for the first time.

You already have a pit in your stomach? You should.

Through Becca’s filmmaking, we start to understand that Nana and Pop Pop are creepy. They insist the kids don’t go into the basement and that they stay locked in their bedroom after 9:30PM. All we know from the neighbors – who only show up when Nana and Pop Pop are out on their weird walks – is that this old, odd couple often volunteers at a local treatment facility.

OK, so, we already have a suspicious setup, too many plot inconsistencies, and general strangeness. Then, the film starts veering into comedy and back out. Tyler has a germ phobia, and he likes to rap. Becca has self-image problems, and she takes her cameras everywhere. That’s nothing like grandma’s scary nighttime wanderings and grandpa’s sudden rages. In essence, all this is too much flotsam to cover up a silly plot that isn’t entirely going to work.

[rating-key]

Shyamalan wrote and directed this. There’s a sense he’s truly trying to entertain the audience with goofy raps and the odd “gotcha” moment. Then, when everything finally unravels – a plot twist people should see coming – the last part of the film is pure Russ Meyer camp. The tone robs the already hole-riddled film of having any lasting impact.

Still, we’ve seen worse; remember The Happening? Maybe The Visit is his comeback, but Shyamalan didn’t come back far enough.